Dead Man Walking
by MintSauce
Summary: Prompt fill. He's not a bad father, not necessarily. He doesn't hurt her, gives her money when she asks for it, but his eyes are empty. He's just a dead man walking.


**Prompt: 15 years past since 3.12. Mickey's daughter is dating Liam, Mickey is still married and hasn't seen Ian since the 'don't' scene. – Anon**

Maddy watched her father as he sat there. It was one of those moments where she understood absolutely nothing about him. Then again, all she really did know was that he had a sweet tooth like a child, hated Maddy's grandfather with a sort of passion that terrified her, hated his wife and Maddy's mother, seemed to hate pretty much everything actually. He never smiled and when he did, it was always sarcastic and never reached his eyes.

Her dad had dead eyes, she'd worked that out a long time ago. He looked at everything without seeing anything at all.

Except for those times when he'd look at her or her mother and something, some emotion would flicker through his eyes that made Maddy want to curl in on herself. She didn't understand it, didn't understand _him_.

Sometimes she wasn't sure if she wanted to.

He wasn't a bad father necessarily. He drank too much sure, but he'd never hurt her. He'd never hurt her mother either. Not once during their numerous screaming matches; and Maddy was positive of that, because she would listen and wait for it sometimes, that sound of flesh on flesh.

It never came though. She expected it to more for the reason that her dad was a violent person. He had FUCK U-UP tattooed on his knuckles for God's sake, of course he was violent. He'd hit people and smashed almost anything he could get his hands on if he got angry enough or drunk enough and he was always bruised in some sort of way. But he never his Maddy or her mum; and Maddy sometimes wanted him to just so she could pinpoint exactly how he was a bad father.

It was hard to explain otherwise.

Because he gave her money for stuff when she asked, was as concerned as he possibly could get when she cried and he had even bandaged up her knee that one time she fell over. But he was detached. For as long as she could remember Mickey Milkovich had been a shell of a person.

Maddy still dreamt about what he was like before, because her Aunt Mandy always described him as this person who was burning underneath their skin, always moving, always fidgeting, always alive.

Except that wasn't her father, because Maddy sometimes felt the need to go over and check he was still breathing. He'd just sit so still. Like he was doing now, just staring down at the phone in his hand.

He did that a lot. Never made a call, just stared at it like maybe he wanted to, but didn't know what to say. Or maybe he didn't know the number.

And Maddy thought that maybe that was why she liked the Gallagher house so much. It was just so alive. So noisy and full of movement. There was always something happening, people running through the house that had never lived there or who at least hadn't done for a long time.

She thought maybe that was why she liked Liam Gallagher so much as well. Beyond the fact he was gorgeous and sweet and had those chocolate brown eyes she could just fall into and lose herself. Plus he was older and actually cared about stuff like school and family. Morals drilled into his by his sister/mother Fiona.

Maddy spent a lot of time with Liam and at the Gallagher house just to try and fill herself up with _noise_. Just to try and make herself feel alive in a way that her own house sapped out of her. Because the Gallagher house was all affection and smiles and Maddy had never seen her dad kiss her mother, let alone smile at either of them like he meant it.

So when she was presented with moments like these where her father was sober yet dead-eyed, staring at the phone clutched in his tattooed fingers, then she just got out of there.

Maddy practically ran the few blocks between her place and the Gallagher house and she already felt lighter by the time she reached the gate. She could already feel herself smiling.

And it didn't even matter that Fiona would sometimes look at her distrustfully, or mutter about history repeating itself. It didn't matter because it was still more of a home than her house was and she needed that.

When she knocked on the door, she didn't recognise the person who answered, but that wasn't too strange a thing for this house. The guy was tall and pale, ginger hair cropped short and muscles bulging underneath his shirt. He was gorgeous if you liked people your dad's age and who similarly had eyes that their emotions didn't quite seem to reach.

"Yeah?" he asked, eyebrow raised as he looked at her.

Maddy smiled at him in response, thinking '_good first impressions and all_' and said, "Liam in?" She already knew he was of course, his bike was propped up against the wall in the hallway behind the ginger. But still, it was polite to ask. Manners or at least some form of them having been instilled in her by her mother. Who insisted Maddy was going to be better than '_that dirty, rude-mouthed Milkovich lot'_, which never failed to make Maddy wonder why the hell her parents had gotten married in the first place. They obviously didn't even _like_ each other.

"Which makes you the girlfriend," the redhead said, nodding and stepping back from the door to let her in, "Liam's just in the shower."

Maddy nodded, "I'll just wait here then, he always gets hungry after he showers for some fucked up reason."

The guy snorted out a laugh, but looked almost sad at the same time. Maybe he hadn't known that, but then practically everyone knew that so Maddy didn't feel guilty for blurting the information out.

She watched as the guy moved comfortably through the house, grabbing a beer even though it was maybe a _little_ early by some people's standards to be drinking. He offered her a Coke.

"Ian Gallagher," he told her when he came back with the can, trying to smile at her and seeming to at least _want_ to mean it.

And it all made sense then. Ian. The Gallagher brother who'd illegally enlisted early into the army. Liam had told her about how he missed Ian even though he didn't _really_ know him. He had made some passing comment about how he was finishing up his last tour, but they'd been high at the time so it hadn't really registered or stuck in her brain.

Ian Gallagher was thirty-two now and Maddy wondered if he felt like a stranger in the house he'd grown up in. She wondered if it had been the army to put that detached look in his eye. Or it if was the reason he had enlisted early that had done that fifteen years ago.

Maddy smiled like she wasn't thinking about how this man looked broken and said, "Maddy Milkovich."

And Ian dropped his beer.

It didn't smash when it hit the ground, just bounced, beer spilling all over the carpet and the bottom of Ian's jeans. He didn't seem to notice though, was just staring at her.

"You… you Mickey's daughter?" he asked and Maddy didn't have a clue what was in his voice as he asked that, but it was a heavy sort of emotion that made her want to flinch.

She nodded.

Ian swallowed loudly, "Is he… um… is he still married to your mum?" And it looked like it kind of hurt him to ask that.

"If you call it a marriage if your dad sleeps on a sleeping bag on top of the covers, then yes," she replied, hating how bitter she sounded. Except, she didn't know what the hell it was supposed to mean that her parents couldn't even stand to sleep in the same bed next to one another. That they never had.

Ian seemed to deflate like someone had stuck a pin in his, shoulders hunching. "I… um… I used to know your dad," he explained after a moment even though Maddy had never asked. "He okay?" he asked next, "I mean, how's he doing?"

And damn, she didn't know why this was all so awkward.

She shrugged. "Yeah, I guess," she told him, "He's the same as he's always been, either drunk or just acting like a dead man walking."

Ian cringed, but at the same time looked almost satisfied. "He's not happy then?"

She laughed just because the word happy could never be used to describe her dad in a million years. "I'm convinced someone fucked him up real bad before I was born, made him this way, that's my top theory."

And Maddy had a lot of theories for why her dad was the way he was.

Ian looked oddly guilty and fucking _wrecked_ all of a sudden. He opened his mouth to say something, a frown creasing the skin between his eyebrows when Liam came thundering down the stairs, wet hair flopping into his eyes.

He kissed her cheek and Maddy beamed, only noticing that Ian had walked away when the front door shut behind him.

"What was up with him?" Liam asked her, moving towards the kitchen no doubt to make a sandwich or something.

Maddy shrugged, looking down at the beer bottle on the carpet, the liquid soaking in and creating a dark patch around it, "No clue."

Two weeks later she woke up to the sound of a laugh she'd never heard before ringing through the house. It was three in the morning and her mum was out working and who the fuck knew where her dad went most nights. She had been home alone as far as she'd known, so Maddy didn't hesitate to grab the bat by the side of her bed and pad out into the living room.

Although, admittedly she was more curious than she was scared. Nobody was really stupid enough to break in to the Milkovich house.

She almost tripped over her own feet in shock though when she heard that unfamiliar laugh again and discovered where it was coming from.

The TV was on low volume, playing some old action movie with a lot of explosions and very little storyline, but it just seemed to be background noise for the two figures on the couch.

They were both sprawled out lazily, feet on the coffee table and a smell collection of beers already on the floor between them.

Her dad had his head tipped back and he blew smoke up at the ceiling, looking lazy and content in that way that Maddy always did when she was high. Ian Gallagher was sitting beside him, eyes watching his eyes move before occasionally flickering back towards the television. His mouth was stretched into a wide grin, an arm over the back of the couch and his torso twisted towards her dad.

He said something in a low voice, too low for Maddy to make out the words, but she watched frozen as her dad laughed, his eyes shining as the explosions on the screen were mirrored in them. His fingers kept alternating between tapping out a rhythm on the bottle in his hand and picking at the label.

And Maddy understood then, just a little. She didn't know why now, she didn't know why for Ian Gallagher; but she understood perfectly what her Aunt Mandy had said about what her dad had used to be like. And she never thought of her dad as good looking or anything other than a shell of a man, but with light and fire in his eyes as he laughed, Maddy thought Mickey Milkovich had never looked more beautiful.

Or more alive.


End file.
